User:Elipongo

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Elipongo
Working, Editing, Bicycling

— Wikipedian ♂ —
In my "office" at work.
Name	Elias Friedman (Hebrew: אליהו מתתיהו בן צבי )
Born	(1969-09-05) September 5, 1969 Hebrew: כב אלול תשכ"ט Mount Sinai Hospital, Hartford, Connecticut United States
Current location	Upper West Side, Manhattan New York, United States
Blood type	O+
Sexuality	Heterosexual
Family and friends
Marital status	Single & looking for my bashert.
Education and employment
Occupation	Critical care paramedic
Employer	SeniorCare EMS
Education	A.S. Mechanical Engineering
High school	Ellington High School
College	Manchester Community College
University	University of Connecticut
Hobbies, interests, and beliefs
Religion	Modern Orthodox Judaism
Politics	Libertarian, Republican
Aliases	Elipongo
Interests
Wikipedia Wikignoming Vandal Watch Reviewing pending changes Welcoming committee Emergency Medicine Judaism Bicycling Connecticut New York City
Contact info
Blog	Elipongo's Blog
Email	elipongo@gmail.com
Elipongo subpages
Subpages, Userboxes
Userboxes
This editor is a Veteran Editor IV and is entitled to display this Gold Editor Star. This user helps out newcomers. This user observes Shabbat. It is approximately 6:52 AM where this user lives. Language enThis user is a native speaker of the English language. USThis user uses American English. he-0משתמש זה אינו מבין עברית (או מבין אותה בקשיים ניכרים).‏ Hebr-2 ש‎This user has an intermediate understanding of the Hebrew alphabet. la-1Hic usor simplici latinitate contribuere potest. Wikipedia AAWThis user is a member of the Association of Apathetic Wikipedians. WPC This user will get around to being a member of the Wikipedian Procrastination Club This user is a member of WikiProject Fraternities and Sororities. This user participates in WikiProject Judaism. This user participates in WikiProject Connecticut. This user regularly reads and responds to Requests for feedback. This user was a member of WikiProject Orthodox Judaism. This user is a member of the user warnings wikiproject. This user is proud to be a member of the Harmonious Editing Club. This user participates in WikiProject Wikipedia Awards. This editor is a WikiGnome. This user reserves the right to completely screw up his own edits. This user tries to do the right thing. If they make a mistake, please let them know. Elipongo has been active on Wikipedia for 21 years, 1 month and 16 days. This user scored 7755 on the Wikipediholic test (revision 181768688). DGAFThis user does not give a fuck. This user is a donor to the Wikimedia Foundation. You can be one, too. This user has rollback rights on the English Wikipedia. (verify) AWW DMBJ AWGC AWAI FDSP BATD MTADThis user is a member of the Association of Wikipedians Who Dislike Making Broad Judgments About the Worthiness of a General Category of Article, and Who Are in Favor of the Deletion of Some Particularly Bad Articles, but That Doesn't Mean They Are Deletionists. This user believes free images should be moved to the Commons. This user fights vandalism with Huggle and Twinkle. Sometimes simultaneously... Thank the IPThis user believes that vandal–reverting IP address editors should be rewarded or thanked for their efforts. This user enjoys cleaning up vandalism. User scriptsI'm using these userscripts: Popups, Friendly, Twinkle, WikEd, FURME → In necessariis unitas, in dubiis libertas, in omnibus caritas. This user knows that replacing one bias with another is not cleanup. Wikipedia is not censored. This user respects copyright and other intellectual property rights. This user finds edit/revert wars disruptive. This user encourages the peaceful correction of vandals. UARThis editor believes that account creation should not be required on Wikipedia. This user welcomes new users with Twinkle! This user thinks that peacocks and weasels should be extinct in Wikipedia. This user thinks that Wikipedia is the best thing since sliced bread. ± strong support/ oppose This user thinks that when people support or oppose a proposal, they should dispense with the notion that by writing Strong Support or Strong Oppose, rather than simply Support or Oppose, their support or opposition counts more. WTF?This user ALWAYS leaves an edit summary. This editor uses AutoWikiBrowser to automate tedious repetitive tasks. <ref>This user would like to see everyone using inline citations. Please... This user doesn't own anything. This user is signed up for the Feedback Request Service. This user participates in WikiProject Freemasonry. This user is a member of WikiProject New York City assessments | recent changes | talk Location This user is a citizen of the United States of America. This user lives in, or hails from, New York City. This user lives in New England. This user lives in the U.S. State of Connecticut. This user grew up in a rural area. Indep homeThis user lives on his own. This user has left the planet Earth 0 times. This user has never left the Northern Hemisphere. 3This user has set foot in 3 continents of the world. 6This user has visited 6 of the 205 countries in the world. This user's time zone is EST. I am... This user is Jewish. This user is of Ashkenazi Jewish ancestry. This user is Modern Orthodox. This user is male. This user is single. 56YThis Wikipedian was born on 5 September 1969 and is 56 years, 2 months, and 3 days old. This user is a Freemason. This user is a Paramedic. This user is near sighted. This user has astigmatism. XThis user is a member of Generation X. This user is heterosexual. This user is not a biological parent. This user is right-handed. 18+This user is an adult. saneThis user is relatively sane and will not stab you when you sleep FS&CThis user is a brother in Triangle Fraternity. This user is a bicyclist. This user is car-free.‡ This user does not smoke. This user is drug-free. This user observes Shabbat. This user observes the dietary laws of Kashrut. This user is NOT known for taking themself too seriously. This user has a blood type of O (Rh) Rhesus Positive. This user was born during the Nixon administration. Activities This user overuses userboxes. This user tracks his money on Where's George? This user releases books at Bookcrossing. Beliefs Non nobis solum This user is not afraid of being wrong. This user is skeptical of the Zodiac. This user is a committed advocate of democracy. This user believes it is every citizen's duty to vote. This user does NOT support abortion except when a woman's life is at serious risk. This user is a skeptic. GOPThis user supports the United States Republican Party This user is against the war on drugs. I would say I'm a cynic but I bet you just wouldn't believe me. This user is interested in the belief that death is an acceptable part of life. This user believes that life is good. User:Lawyer2b/CCW This user is a masculist. This user is against DRM. Hanlon's RazorThis user never attributes to malice that which is best explained by stupidity. † This user respects women and rejects any violence against women. This user supports the troops in Iraq. This user supports flat taxes. This user is opposed to communism in both theory and practice. This user is skeptical of anthropogenic global warming. This user supports public transit. This user supports the use of nuclear energy. > This user knows that genetically modified food has saved over a billion lives, and that all agriculture is "genetic modification", what we do today is just faster. This user opposes monarchism. In Memoriam: 9/11 Lest we forget… EuThis user does NOT support euthanasia and is strongly opposed to all forms of eugenics. This user knows that free trade protects more jobs than tariffs do. This user supports jury nullification.‡ This user finds censorship offensive. This user was against the Disengagement Plan in Israel. This user supports President George W. Bush. LEGALThis user supports LEGAL Immigration. This user will never forget. This user supports Sarah Palin and John McCain !! Technology @This user can be reached by email at elipongo@gmail.com. This user maintains a facebook profile as Elias Friedman. + This user posts on X as @elipongo. G talkThis user's Google Talk screenname is elipongo. BThis user keeps a weblog at Blogger as elipongo's blog. This user has a profile on MySpace as elipongo. This user is an editor on Wikivoyage. BASICThis user can program in BASIC. This user uses Google as a primary search engine. This user uses Wikipedia as a primary point of reference. This user uses Gmail as a primary email service. C++This user can program in C++. BASICThis user can program in BASIC. forThis user can program in Fortran. This user can fairly easily contribute using either Firefox or Google Chrome. This user contributes using Microsoft Windows Vista. This user contributes using Notepad. This user contributes using a laptop. This user contributes using a wireless connection. BBThis user contributes using a broadband connection. This user uses Google Maps. This user has a LinkedIn profile as user elipongo. This user likes the Dogpile search engine. This user's Internet service provider is Verizon. intel CoreThis user contributes with a computer based on the Intel Core 2 Duo microprocessor. IPThis user has a dynamic IP address. This user's mobile phone and data-services provider is Verizon. This user writes with the OpenOffice.org suite. This user loves using Google Earth. This user's Casio Waveceptor watch is set to 7:52am. Preferences This user is attracted to red hair. ALLThis user is a fan of all kinds of comedy. This user eats bagels. This user eats chicken. This user prefers rare steak. This user enjoys their egg with the sunny side up. This user loves brownies. This user likes Chocolate Chip Cookies. This user's favorite ice cream flavor is mint chocolate chip. This user drinks chocolate milk. C2H5OH-1This user drinks relatively infrequently. he is probably the better for it. This user enjoys klezmer. This user likes most types of music. This user enjoys reading science fiction. This user enjoys comics. This user prefers warm weather. This user is interested in politics. This user is an omnivore. BM This user is repulsed by most forms of body modification. This user dislikes mosquitos. met?This user prefers metric units, but, having grown up in the United States, cannot relate to them. they he or sheThis user considers the singular they to be substandard English usage. snukThis user says snuck. to¦goThis user chooses to sometimes use split infinitives. byThe passive voice may be used by this user. …in.Ending a sentence with a preposition is something that this user is okay with. man- kindRegarding gender, this user prefers the vernacular, not what is politically correct. to too twoThis user thinks that too many people have no idea how to use words that they should have learned in grade two. whomThis user insists upon using whom wherever it is called for, and fixes the errors of whomever he sees. their there they'reThis user thinks that there are too many people who don’t know that they're worse than their own children at spelling! your you'reThis user thinks that if your grammar is incorrect, then you're in need of help. their, to, your, its, ... This users english is far from being perfect!. its it'sIt's really not that hard to use each word in its proper manner. ANAL 4This user advocates good grammar usage. This user enjoys the big band sound This user enjoys classical music. This user enjoys jazz music. This user enjoys reading Fantasy. This user reads science fiction. This user loves sunny days This user loathes, but is forced to observe, daylight saving time. Interests This user is a history buff. $\int e^{x}dx$ | I | N | T | E | G | R | A | L | S | My antiderivative $0.{\bar {9}}$=1 This user knows that 0.9...(repeating) is exactly 1 and can prove it, but wishes that other people could understand it the way he does. This user knows how to travel 1 mile due south, due east, then due north and end up where he started.† $\textstyle {\frac {\partial }{\partial x}}\,\;$ This user only partially understands mathematics. Three, plus a hair This user likes trigonometry. This user is interested in space sciences. Favorites This user's homeworld is mostly harmless. Narnia This user loves The Chronicles of Narnia. This user enjoys the works of Sherlock Holmes. HPThis user is a Harry Potter fan. This user is a hoopy frood who really knows where his towel is. This user enjoys the works of Robert A. Heinlein BB This user is on a mission from God. FCThis user does not talk about Fight Club. This user is a fan of the Austin Powers film series. Yeah, baby, yeah! 007This user likes martinis shaken, not stirred. ND This user voted for Pedro. This user's got a case of the Mondays. This user has a feeling that we're not in Kansas anymore. A person is smart; people are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals and you know it! This user thinks 2001: A Space Odyssey is the best science fiction film ever made. STAR WARSThis user is a Star Wars fan. PRODUCERSThis user keeps it gay! This user rejects your reality and substitutes their own! d'oh!This user thinks The Simpsons is simply... excellent. This user enjoys Star Trek. MWC A fat woman came into this user's shoe store today. M*A*S*HThis user understands: "the M stands for mobile". C&HThis user reads Calvin and Hobbes. SThis user fights for truth, justice and the American way! This user is a Monty Python fan. This user is a Marxist of the Groucho variety. This user knows Who's on First. This user likes George Washington. This user likes Alexander Hamilton. This user likes Thomas Paine. This user greatly admires Abraham Lincoln. This user thinks Ronald Reagan was an excellent president. This user knows the Ultimate Answer. This user enjoys music by Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina. This user enjoys music by Antonio Vivaldi. This user enjoys music by George Frideric Handel. This user enjoys music by Johann Sebastian Bach. This user enjoys music by Ludwig van Beethoven. This user enjoys music by Joseph Haydn. This user enjoys music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. This user enjoys music by Antonín Dvořák. This user likes music by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. This user visits Astronomy Picture of the Day every day. † This user is an Americophile. This user enjoys the works of David Brin. OSCThis user enjoys the works of Orson Scott Card. This user believes there ain't no such thing as a free lunch. This user's looking at you, kid. This user wants to make you an offer you can't refuse. 🐦 This user is the stuff that dreams are made of. This user believes any answer I give will be wrong and the Senior Drill Instructor will only beat this user harder if I reverse myself. Frankly my dear, this user doesn't give a damn. "Surely this user can't be serious?" Clue This user killed Yvette. This user hated her... so... much... It- It... the f-- It... Flame... Flames. Flames... On the side of my face... Breathing... Breathle-- Heaving breaths... Heaving... This user is a man-eating talking plant. This user will be back. FGThis user thinks Family Guy is freakin' sweet. LTIThis user embiggens Wikipedia with their cromulent editing! CheersSometimes you wanna go where everybody knows your name. This user has just crossed into... The Twilight Zone. STAR TREKElipongo is a fan of Star Trek: The Original Series.TOS xkcdStand back! This user is going to try science with xkcd. Education This User attends or attended the University of Connecticut. ASThis user has an Associate of Science degree. Miscellaneus This user remembers using a rotary dial telephone. Ceci n'est pas une boîte utilisateur. This user needs more userboxes. MORE, I tell you, more!!! Muhahaha! This user's dog(s) died. This user's parents are dead. Wheaties, Cheerios, and Rice Chex This user prefers the cereal comma. Iи Sоviэт Яцssiд, Цsэяьож дdd УОЦ!! All your base are belong to this user. Put the number 25 in a calculator. Multiply by 800. Multiply by 266. Subtract 1,992. Then look at the calculator upside-down... This user loves tricks like this. This user would have liked Green Eggs and Ham, but will not eat them due to religious dietary laws. This user passed GO! (…so where is my $200?) This user knows how to Find x. KAZOOThis user plays the Kazoo. This user knows the dire side effects of dihydrogen monoxide. Do you? This user enjoys siesta.

Bio

My name is Elias Friedman (Hebrew: אליהו מתתיהו בן צבי). I'm a critical care paramedic living in the Upper West Side section of Manhattan in New York City. I moved here at the end of December 2008 from Connecticut.

I'm a 56 year old, single, Modern Orthodox Jewish male. I grew up in Ellington, Connecticut where I was the president of Congregation Knesseth Israel.

I got into EMS in 1997 when I started volunteering in Coventry. I got a job at a commercial ambulance service in 1999 when I was laid-off from my previous job as a Pellet mill operator in a feed mill. I got my Associate's degree from Manchester Community College in Mechanical Engineering in 2000 which was also the year I became an EMT-Intermediate. I was working on completing my B.S. in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Connecticut when September 11th made me re-think my priorities. I entered Hartford Hospital's Paramedic program and graduated in April 2004. My precepting was delayed to September due to my father's death that July, and I've had med-control since December 2004. In the first week of September 2008 I was laid off from my job at the Ambulance service of Manchester, but since I was already in the process of getting reciprocity of my paramedic license for New York, it didn't let it upset me too much. In December of 2008 I started to work for SeniorCare EMS which has bases in both the Bronx and in Brooklyn, I quite enjoy working there! In the Summer of 2012 I became a volunteer paramedic member of West Side Hatzolah so I can better help my local community as well.

Ready for a bicycle ride!

The second half of my username is derived from my Dalmatian, Pongo, who died in March 2006, just a week shy of his sixteenth birthday.

I really enjoy my working in EMS, my friends have remarked (positively!) that I love to talk about my work. Getting up out of bed to go to work isn't an effort of willpower like it had often been at my previous jobs. My health and stress level are better than they have ever been, of course that's partly attributable to my taking up year-round bicycle commuting the eleven miles to work. I really think that I've found my niche.

I am a member of the Connecticut Chapter of Triangle Fraternity, the Republican Jewish Coalition, the Republican National Committee, and the NAEMT. I am a master Freemason. I am a former member of the ASME

Wikipedia ads	file info – show another – #217

float

Wiki stats

N.B. These edit counts tend to move down over time as pages (and my edits) get deleted.

• My first (registered) edit diff. Awww, they're all so cute when they're young!
• My 500^th edit diff. Just wikignoming around.
• My 1,000^th edit diff. Wouldn't you just figure it would have to do with vandalism...
• My 5,000^th edit diff. Yeah, a pretty dumb one...
• My 10,000^th edit diff. Cleaning up incoming links to disambiguation pages.

Things I'm working on

Feel free to help out on any of these items!

Existing pages

float

• Bulkeley Bridge
• Captain John Bissell Memorial Bridge
• Congregation Knesseth Israel— I can't do too much more here because I have a conflict of interest, but I hope that others will help out.
• Connecticut
• Dexter Coffin Bridge
• Ellington Airport (Connecticut)
• Ellington, Connecticut
• Ellington High School
• Etiquette in Latin America, orphaned references etc from unfixed deletions of citations.
• Hartford, Connecticut
• History of Connecticut industry
• Icebiking
• List of beaches in New England
• List of Lieutenant Governors of Connecticut
• List of U.S. state songs
• Manchester, Connecticut
• Manchester Road Race
• Motorola#Trivia
• Neighborhoods of Hartford, Connecticut
• Nullification— Dab page that needs cleanup per MoS:DAB and has a whole article on its talk page that should go somewhere, if it hasn't already.
• Park River (Connecticut)
• Papoose
• Sean Sullivan
• The Shoppes at Buckland Hills
• Thomas Joseph Meskill
• WikiProject Connecticut— lots of work to do here!

Pages yet to be created

• History of racism in Connecticut
• List of U.S. state heroines— I think that only CT & MA have one.

To do

• Write up report on Lord & Taylor vandal for WP:LTA
• Create navigation template for Investment banks

Community

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Events and projects [add]

Yearly or infrequent events

Monthly or continuous events

• Monthly contest, WikiProject Military history. The contest department of the Military history WikiProject aims to motivate increased quality in military history articles by offering a form of friendly competition for project members making improvements to them. The primary contest available is a simple rolling competition that awards points for improving articles. The contest runs from the first to last day of each month.
• Guild of Copy Editors' editing drive. The November 2025 backlog drive is a one-month-long effort by the Guild of Copy Editors to reduce the backlog of articles that require copy editing: those carrying the {{copy edit}} tag (also {{awkward}}, {{copy edit section}}, {{inappropriate person}}, and {{copy edit inline}}, and their redirects) or are listed on the GOCE Requests page. It began on 1 November, 00:00 (UTC), and will end on 30 November, 23:59 (UTC).
• Wikipedia:WikiProject Women in Red 2025 Events:

Recently completed:	Alphabet run: S & T Women in STEM Halloween
New this month:	Alphabet run: U, V, W Asian women
Ongoing initiatives:	Music #1day1woman
Upcoming events:	Ideas

Meetups for November 2025 +/-

Seattle Wikidata  13th Birthday	November 1, 2025 (2025-11-01)
Cardiff 5	November 6, 2025 (2025-11-06)
Philadelphia WikiSalon	November 8, 2025 (2025-11-08)
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London 222	November 9, 2025 (2025-11-09)
Minnesota	November 11, 2025 (2025-11-11)
West Hollywood	November 15, 2025 (2025-11-15)
Oxford 117	November 16, 2025 (2025-11-16)
Seattle meetup	November 18, 2025 (2025-11-18)
Chicago Nov 2025	November 22, 2025 (2025-11-22)
Perth 90	November 23, 2025 (2025-11-23)
Aberdeen 7	November 24, 2025 (2025-11-24)
Brighton 7	November 29, 2025 (2025-11-29)

Meetups for December 2025 +/-

Philadelphia WikiSalon	December 13, 2025 (2025-12-13)
London 223	December 14, 2025 (2025-12-14)
Seattle meetup	December 16, 2025 (2025-12-16)

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Also consider posting WikiProject, Task Force, and Collaboration news at The Signpost's WikiProject Report page. Please include your signature when adding a listing here.

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    • Outline of the Russo-Ukrainian War
  • The Outline of the week is Outline of ancient Egypt.
  • Please help improve them. —The Transhumanist 11:45, 21 October 2025 (UTC)
• WikiProject Magic: The Gathering has been cleaned up and is looking for interested participants. Also welcoming general suggestions and collabs. Snuggle 🖤 (talk) 20:43, 7 October 2025 (UTC)
• WP Unreferenced articles is trying to clear the decades-long backlog of unreferenced articles, please help to lower the number of unreferenced articles below 40,000. Come contribute! Catfurball (talk) 19:58, 10 September 2025 (UTC)
• WikiProject Haiti is newly renovated and looking for interested participants. Averageuntitleduser (talk) 15:38, 21 July 2025 (UTC)
• WikiProject Kabbalah is re-activating as there are a lot of maintenance templates on these articles and new references and inline citations are needed. See Kabbalah Books Online. New participants welcome!! Nnev66 (talk) 23:07, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

Technical news

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Updates for editors

• Administrators will now find that Special:MergeHistory is now significantly more flexible about what it can merge. It can now merge sections taken from the middle of the history of the source (rather than only the start) and insert revisions anywhere in the history of the destination page (rather than only the start). [1]
• For users with "Automatically subscribe to topics" enabled in their preferences, starting a new topic or adding a reply to an existing topic will now subscribe them to replies to that topic. Previously, this would only happen if the DiscussionTools "Add topic" or "Reply" widgets were used. When DiscussionTools was originally launched existing accounts were not opted in to automatic topic subscriptions, so this change should primarily affect newer accounts and users who have deliberately changed their preferences since that time. [2]
• Scribunto modules can now be used to generate SVG images. This can be used to build charts, graphics and other visualizations dynamically through Lua, reducing the need to compose them externally and upload them as files. [3]
• Wikimedia sites now provide all anonymous users with the option to enable a dark mode color scheme, featuring light-colored text on a dark background. This enhancement aims to deliver a more enjoyable reading experience, especially in dimly lit environments. [4]
• Users with large watchlists have long faced timeouts when editing Special:EditWatchlist. The page now loads entries in smaller sections instead of all at once due to a paging update, allowing everyone to edit their watchlists smoothly. As part of the database update, sorting by expiry has been removed because it was over 100× slower than sorting by title. A community wish has been created to explore alternative ways to restore sort-by-expiry. If this feature is important to you, please support the wish! [5]
• View all 31 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, the fixing of the persisting highlighting when using VisualEditor find and replace during a query. [6]

Updates for technical contributors

• Since 2019 the Wikimedia URL Shortener at https://w.wiki is available for all Wikimedia wikis to create short links to articles, permalinks, diffs, etc. It is available in the sidebar as "Get shortened URL". There are 30 wikis that also install an older "ShortUrl" extension. The old extension will soon be removed. This means /s/ URLs will not be advertised under article titles via HTML class="title-shortlink". The /s/ URLs will keep working. [7]
• On Thursday, October 30, the MediaWiki Interfaces and SRE Service Operations teams began rerouting Action API traffic through a common API gateway. Individual wikis will be updated based on the standard release groups, with total traffic increased over time. This change is expected to be non-breaking and non-disruptive. If any issues are observed, please file a Phabricator ticket to the Service Ops team board.
• MediaWiki Train deployments will pause for the final two weeks of 2025: 22 December and 29 December. Backport windows will also pause between Monday, 22 December 2025 and Thursday, 2 January 2026. A backport window is a scheduled time to add things like bug fixes and configuration changes. There are seven deployment trains remaining for 2025. [8]
• Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki

In depth

• In 2025, the Wikimedia Foundation reported that AI systems and search engines increasingly use Wikipedia content without driving users to the site, contributing to an 8% drop in human pageviews compared to 2024. After detecting bots disguised as humans, Wikimedia updated its traffic data to reflect this shift. Read more about current user trends on Wikipedia in a Diff blog post.

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General notices

• Eligible users are invited to submit a candidacy for the Arbitration Committee elections at the elections page.
• Edits by logged out users will no longer display an IP address. Instead a temporary account such as ~2025-11111-11 will be created automatically upon making an edit.

• What should happen to speedy deletion criterion X3?
• New GA quick fail criterion for AI
• Amending process to retain adminship after recall
• Writing articles with large language models
• Admin recall check-in
• Adding a "wait and see" !vote to AfD

Parsha

Weekly Torah Portion

Vayeira (וירא)

Genesis 18:1–22:24

The Weekly Torah portion in synagogues on Shabbat, Saturday, 18 Cheshvan, 5776; October 31, 2015

"Is anything too wondrous for the Lord?" (Genesis 18:14.)

Abraham and the Three Angels (engraving by Gustave Doré)

As Abraham was sitting at the entrance of his tent by the terebinths of Mamre at the heat of the day, he looked up and saw God in the form of three men, and he ran, bowed to the ground, and welcomed them. Abraham offered to wash their feet and fetch them a morsel of bread, and they assented. Abraham rushed to Sarah's tent to order cakes made from choice flour, ran to select a choice calf for a servant-boy to prepare, set curds and milk and the calf before them, and waited on them under the tree as they ate.

One of the visitors told Abraham that he would return the next year, and Sarah would have a son, but Sarah laughed to herself at the prospect, with Abraham so old. God then questioned Abraham why Sarah had laughed at bearing a child at her age, noting that nothing was too wondrous for God. Frightened, Sarah denied laughing, but God insisted that she had.

The men set out toward Sodom and Abraham walked with them to see them off. God considered whether to confide in Abraham what God was about to do, since God had singled out Abraham to become a great nation and instruct his posterity to keep God's way by doing what was just and right. God told Abraham that the outrage and sin of Sodom and Gomorrah was so great that God was going to see whether they had acted according to the outcry that had reached God. The men went on to Sodom, while Abraham remained standing before God. Abraham pressed God whether God would sweep away the innocent along with the guilty, asking successively if there were 50, or 45, or 40, or 30, or 20, or 10 innocent people in Sodom, would God not spare the city for the sake of the innocent ones, and each time God agreed to do so. When God had finished speaking to Abraham, God departed, and Abraham returned to his place.

As Lot was sitting at the gate of Sodom in the evening, the two angels arrived, and Lot greeted them and bowed low to the ground. Lot invited the angels to spend the night at his house and bathe their feet, but they said that they would spend the night in the square. Lot urged them strongly, so they went to his house, and he prepared a feast for them and baked unleavened bread, and they ate.

Before they had retired for the night, all the men of Sodom gathered about the house shouting to Lot to bring his visitors out so that they might be intimate with them. Lot went outside the entrance, shutting the door behind him, and begged the men of Sodom not commit such a wrong. Lot offered the men his two virgin daughters for them to do with as they pleased, if they would not do anything to his guests, but they disparaged Lot as one who had come as an alien and now sought to rule them, and they pressed threateningly against him and the door. But the visitors stretched out their hands and pulled Lot back into the house and shut the door and struck the people with blinding light that made them unable to find the entrance.

Flight of Lot (illustration by Gustave Doré)

The visitors directed Lot to bring what family he had out of the city, for they were about to destroy the place, because the outcry against its inhabitants had become so great. So Lot told his sons-in-law that they needed to get out of the place because God was about to destroy it, but Lot's sons-in-law thought that he was joking.

As dawn broke, the angels urged Lot to flee with his wife and two remaining daughters, but still he delayed. So out of God's mercy, the men seized Lot, his wife, and daughters by the hand and brought them out of the city, telling them to flee for their lives and not to stop or look back anywhere in the plain. But Lot asked them whether he might flee to a little village nearby, and the angel replied that he would grant Lot this favor too, and spare that town. The angel urged Lot to hurry there, for the angel could not do anything until he arrived there, and thus the town came to be called Zoar.

The Destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (painting by John Martin)

As the sun rose and Lot entered Zoar, God rained sulfurous fire from heaven on Sodom and Gomorrah and annihilated the entire plain. Lot's wife looked back, and she turned into a pillar of salt. Next morning, Abraham hurried to the place where he had stood before God and looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah and saw the smoke rising like at a kiln.

Lot and his Daughters (painting by Hendrik Goltzius)

Lot was afraid to dwell in Zoar, so he settled in a cave in the hill country with his two daughters. The older daughter told the younger that their father was old, and there was not a man on earth with whom to have children, so she proposed that they get Lot drunk and lie with him so that they might maintain life through their father. That night they made their father drink wine, and the older one lay with her father without his being aware. And the next day the older one persuaded the younger to do the same. The two daughters thus had children by their father, the older one bore a son named Moab who became the father of the Moabites, and the younger bore a son named Ben-ammi who became the father of the Ammonites.

Abraham settled between Kadesh and Shur. While he was sojourning in Gerar, Abraham said that Sarah was his sister, so King Abimelech had her brought to him, but God came to Abimelech in a dream and told him that taking her would cause him to die, for she was a married woman. Abimelech had not approached her, so he asked God whether God would slay an innocent, as Abraham and Sarah had told him that they were brother and sister. God told Abimelech in the dream that God knew that Abimelech had a blameless heart, and so God had kept him from touching her. God told Abimelech to restore Abraham's wife, since he was a prophet, and he would intercede for Abimelech to save his life, which he and his household would lose if he failed to restore her.

Early next morning, Abimelech told his servants what had happened, asked Abraham what he had done and why he had brought so great a guilt upon Abimelech and his kingdom. Abraham replied that he had thought that Gerar had no fear of God and would kill him because of his wife, and that she was in fact his father's daughter though not his mother's, so he had asked of her the kindness of identifying him as her brother. Abimelech restored Sarah to Abraham, gave him sheep, oxen, and slaves, and invited him to settle wherever he pleased in Abimelech's lands. And Abimelech told Sarah that he was giving Abraham a thousand pieces of silver to serve her as vindication before all. Abraham then prayed to God, and God healed Abimelech and the women in his household, so that they bore children, for God had stricken the women with infertility because of Sarah.

God took note of Sarah, and she bore Abraham a son as God had predicted, and Abraham named him Isaac. Abraham circumcised Isaac when he was eight days old. Abraham was 100 years old when Isaac was born, and Sarah remarked that God had brought her laughter and everyone would laugh with her about her bearing Abraham a child in his old age. Abraham held a great feast on the day that Sarah weaned Isaac.

The Expulsion of Hagar (painting by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo)

Sarah saw Hagar's son Ishmael playing, and Sarah told Abraham to cast Hagar and Ishmael out, saying that Ishmael would not share in Abraham's inheritance with Isaac. Sarah's words greatly distressed Abraham, but God told Abraham not to be distressed but to do whatever Sarah told him, for Isaac would carry on Abraham's line, and God would make a nation of Ishmael, too. Early the next morning, Abraham placed some bread and water on Hagar's shoulder, together with Ishmael, and sent them away.

Hagar and Ishmael (painting by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo)

Hagar and Ishmael wandered in the wilderness of Beersheba, and when the water ran out, she left the child under a bush, sat down a bowshot away so as not to see the child die, and burst into tears. God heard the cry of the boy, and an angel called to Hagar, saying not to fear, for God had heeded the boy's cry, and would make of him a great nation. Then God opened her eyes to a well of water, and she and the boy drank. God was with Ishmael and he grew up in the wilderness and became a bowman. Ishmael lived in the wilderness of Paran, and Hagar got him an Egyptian wife.

Abimelech and Phicol the chief of his troops asked Abraham to swear not to deal falsely with them. Abraham reproached Abimelech because Abimelech's servants had seized Abraham's well, but Abimelech protested ignorance. Abraham gave Abimelech sheep and oxen and two men made a pact. Abraham then offered Abimelech seven ewes as proof that Abraham had dug the well. They called the place Beersheba, for the two of them swore an oath there. After they concluded their pact, Abimelech and Phicol returned to Philistia, and Abraham planted a tamarisk and invoked God's name. Abraham lived in Philistia a long time.

Trial of Abraham's Faith (engraving by Gustave Doré)

Some time later, God tested Abraham, directing him to take Isaac to the land of Moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering. Early the next morning, Abraham saddled his donkey and split wood for the burnt offering, and then he, two of his servants, and Isaac set out for the place that God had named. On the third day, Abraham saw the place from afar, and directed his servants to wait with the donkey, while Isaac and he went up to worship and then return. Abraham took the firestone and the knife, put the wood on Isaac, and the two walked off together. When Isaac asked Abraham where the sheep was for the burnt offering, Abraham replied that God would see to the sheep for the burnt offering.

The Angel Hinders the Offering of Isaac (painting by Rembrandt)

They arrived at the place that God had named, and Abraham built an altar, laid out the wood, bound Isaac, laid him on the altar, and picked up the knife to slay his son. Then an angel called to Abraham, telling him not to raise his hand against the boy, for now God knew that Abraham feared God, since he had not withheld his son. Abraham looked up and saw a ram caught in a thicket by its horns, so he offered it as a burnt offering in place of his son. Abraham named the site Adonai-yireh.

The angel called to Abraham a second time, saying that because Abraham had not withheld his son, God would bless him and make his descendants as numerous as the stars of heaven and the sands on the seashore, and victorious over their foes. All the nations of the earth would bless themselves by Abraham's descendants, because he obeyed God's command. Abraham returned to his servants, and they departed for Beersheba; where Abraham stayed.

Later, Abraham learned that Milcah had borne eight children to his brother Nahor, among whom was Bethuel, who became the father of Rebekah. Nahor's concubine Reumah also bore him four children.

Hebrew and English Text
Hear the parshah chanted
Commentary from the Jewish Theological Seminary of America (Conservative)
Commentary by the Union for Reform Judaism (Reform)
Commentaries from Chabad.org (Orthodox)
Commentaries from Aish HaTorah (Orthodox)
Commentaries from the Jewish Reconstructionist Federation (Reconstructionist)
Commentaries from My Jewish Learning (trans-denominational)

Commentaries from Aleph Beta Academy

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Awards & barnstars

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♠TomasBat (@)(Contribs)(Sign!) 21:54, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

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		For your willingness to help a new user in a difficult and time-consuming situation, with little potential for any appreciation at all, I am delighted to award you this barnstar. Thank you for trying to keep a new editor contributing! Accounting4Taste:talk 16:20, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

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On 4 January, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Republic of Lakotah, which you created or substantially expanded. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

--Royalbroil 16:43, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

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		Given to me and other attendees of the March 2008 New York City meetup by Mindspillage (talk · contribs)

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For protecting my user page and user talk page. Razorflame 03:55, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

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